2023 Young Climate Prize Winners

One of the defining characteristics of The World Around, the nonprofit platform whose inaugural summit took place in New York at the beginning of 2020, is optimism. With programs curated by Beatrice Galilee, the platform's events — from that first live summit, the subsequent one forced online by the pandemic, and the summits that are once again in-person — have involved people and projects that use architecture, art, design, and film to address and even solve some of the world's most pressing problems. 

That optimism, which is infectious in attending the TED Talk-style summits, extends to the inaugural Young Climate Prize, which started with “an international open call that received hundreds of entries from more than 50 countries,” per The World Around, “and a subsequent three-month-long mentorship and academy program for a cohort of 25 exceptional climate leaders.”

Following the program, a jury comprised of curator and critic Hans Ulrich Obrist, artist Adrián Villar Rojas, editor Asad Syrkett, architect Kunlé Adeyemi, curator and writer Priya Khanchandani, sustainability leader Marlo Sablante, and environmental social scientist Holly Jean Buck selected three winners and a special jury prize. Videos of the four prizes are below; all winners will be celebrated at The World Around Summit 2023 on April 22.

Young Climate Visionary Prize: Namra Khalid from Pakistan (with mentor Henk Ovink, Dutch Special Envoy for International Water Affairs) for Karachi Cartography, which “addresses a continuous cycle of record-breaking rains, urban flooding, and drought that Pakistan has faced.”

Young Climate Voice: Pamela Elizarrarás Acitores from Mexico (with mentor Mariana Pestana, an architect and independent curator from Portugal) for Climate Words, “a growing online database that promotes climate literacy by curating an extensive lexicon of keywords submitted by expert climate activists.” 

Young Climate Designer: Foday David Kamara from Sierra Leone (with mentor Dominic Leong, architect and co-founder of Leong Leong) is recognized for co-founding Ecovironment, which “uses plastic extrusion technology to transform waste into paving tiles – reducing the reliance on imported cement bricks.”

Special Jury Prize: Aziba Ekio, the poet from Nigeria (mentored with Sumayya Vally, founder and director of Counterspace) whose work is “bringing light to the climate crisis through writing and spoken word,” including The Color, Green, an anthology that contributes to the fight for climate action.